Community sustainability in rural Australia: a question of capital? Funded by the Australian Research Council under a Learned Academies Special Projects Scheme, the research was coordinated by the Academy of Social Sciences Australia and co-edited by Centre Director/Professor Margaret Alston and Chris Cocklin from Monash University. A case study on Tumbarumba conducted by Jane WIlkinson, Ian Gray and Margaret Alston is featured.

Employment of young people in rural areas. Recent decades have seen an exodus of satisfying, full time jobs from small rural towns leaving young people with little choice but to move in search of work. Margaret Alston and Jenny Kent make a series of recommendations to improve the employment prospects of young people in rural areas.

Eco-taxes. Green taxes have been introduced in a number of countries to change behaviour and raise revenue. Possible areas for greater use of green taxes and other market based instruments include water management, toxic waste disposal, pesticide use, emissions and fuel consumption. This paper by Suzi Kerr examines the arguments for greater use of eco-taxes. ?Ecological Tax Reform? is published by the Motu Research Trust for the NZ Ministry for the Environment.